The History of Air Conditioning

The History of Air Conditioning

You must be enjoying the cool air of an air conditioned room either at home/office or restaurant but have you ever thanked the person who actually invented it? The credit goes to Willis Haviland Carrier in 1902. But do you know that the air conditioning unit was developed to create a stable environment in a printing plant which greatly improvised the four colour printing process undertaken there.

Willis Haviland Carrier applied his knowledge of heating the objects with steam i.e. hot air and then reversed the process. This proved very effective in controlling the humidity in the room for instead of sending air over hot coils he sent them through cold coils which were filled with water. Over a period of time, the principle of air conditioning was commercially applied to various industrial processes which required control of temperature and humidity levels – textiles, film, tobacco, processed meats, medicine capsules, films etc.

It was only in 1915 when Willis Haviland Carrier along with six fellow engineers established the Carrier Engineering Corporation for improving the air conditioning technology with a capital of $35,000. However the term “Air Conditioning” was suggested by Stuart H. Cramer, a textile engineer who filed a patent for a gadget which involved the process of adding water vapor to the air in the textile plants in order to condition the yarn.

By the late 1920s, air conditioners were developed for cooling business units frequently visited by large number of people such as movie theaters, departmental stores etc. For instance, J.L. Hudson Department Store in Detroit, Michigan which got three Carrier centrifugal chillers encouraging its customers to visit the first ‘air conditioned’ store.

Similarly, the Rivoli Theater in New York also made supernormal profits when it offered movies in cooled screens. For catering to the domestic cooling requirement, Willis Carrier developed ‘Weathermaker’ for private homes which then gained considerable popularity and what followed is the ever increasing need of installing an air conditioner even today.

Currently, you can choose from highly improved and energy saving air conditioner models offered by top rated MNCs such as Carrier, Croma, Panasonic, Voltas, Hitachi, Blue Star and many others. Also one must visit CompareRaja.in to compare the different models and prices and choose the best one.